An incomprehensible rhetoric

• Citation: 2022 Acta Juridica 70
• Date: 05 September 2022
• Published date: 05 September 2022
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.47348/ACTA/2022/a3
• Pages: 70-87

70

https://doi.org/10.47348/ACTA/2022/a3

An incomprehensible rhetoric

PASCA L ENGE L*

In his pioneering essays on the role of rhetoric in political

discourse in South Af rica, and i n particular within the Truth and

Reconcilia tion Commission, Ph ilippe-Joseph Sal azar has emphas ised

the ‘postmoder nist’ overtone s of these debates. But he has clearly

distinguished an Aristotelian l ine in the use of rhetoric in politics,

according to which it ought to promote t ruth in order to convince,

and a Protag orean line, accord ing to which tr uth is relative an d useless.

Some commentators on these issues, such as Barbara Cassin, have –

without a blin k – espoused the postmodern ist and Prot agorean l ine.

I take their v iew to be incomprehensible and incoherent. R hetoric

should not be used a s a tool to bury truth, but t o praise it. So, I prefer

to see Salazar more as an Aristotelian than as a Protagorean.

I IN TRODUCTION

Philippe-Joseph Salazar, in his numerous and remarkable

investigations on the power of rhetoric in contemporary political

discourses, has been cautious to distance his views from those of

the postmodernists for whom rhetoric has nothing to do with

truth. The art of speech, for classical rhetoricians, had three

functions: to convince (docere), to please (delectare) and to move

(movere). It was at the service of passion and desire, but also of

reason. Reason can only be convinced by truth. The Sophists and

the postmodernists reduce eloquence only to the manipulation of

opinion through emotion and desire. Discourse, for them, is only,

as they say, ‘performative’ – at the service of action and power.

How could Salazar have led such incisive and insightful analyses

of the rhetoric of the jihadists and of white supremacists if he

had accepted the postmodernist view that all discourses are equal

with respect to their truth, and that we live in a ‘post-truth’ era?

Nevertheless, at some point, Salazar, in his work related to the

Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in South Africa,

has asserted that South Africa is not only a springboard for the

study of the rhetoric of political discourse during this period, but

also that it exemplies a number of postmodernist themes:

* D irector of Studies, S chool for Advanced Studies in t he Social Sciences.

2022 Acta Juridica 70

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AN INCOMPR EHENSIBLE R HETORIC 71

https://doi.org/10.47348/ACTA/2022/a3

South Afr ica oers a remarkable sta ge for a replay of the great

themes of public del iberation and the rise of a post modern rhetorical

democracy. South Africa indeed oers a unique example of a

democracy that has issued from a régi me which both magnied

and predated European colonialism , a democracy t hat has broken

that mold without a revolution and its usual sequels and w ithout an

anarchic d isinteg ration—t he two models known so far in analogous

situations. This is why I believe South Af rica fully qualies for the

adjective postmodern.1

I agree with Salazar that there is something remarkable and

unique among the situations which have been described as

forms of ‘transitional justice’ in the post-apartheid South Africa,

and that the deliberations which have led to the formation of a

democracy have something in common with the debates which

shaped the Athenian democracy. But does that a llow us to talk

of a post-modern rhetorical democracy and, if the analogy holds,

is it a good thing? One of the most well-known post-modernist

themes is relativ ism, which was indeed the chief doctrine of the

Athenian Sophists. They insisted on the necessit y of rejecting the

absolutist conception of tr uth, and of accepting that truth is, by

essence, plural. But it is one thing to obser ve that South Africa is

an ‘African Athens’ and that rhetoric is the proper tool to study

these developments, and it is another thing to accept the relativism

and the postmodernism of the Sophists. I think that neither the

promoters of the TRC nor Salazar take this second line, although

it is clear that some contemporary disciples of Protagoras squarely

accept truth rel ativism and its consequences. I want to ex plain here

that, if they do accept this view, they subscr ibe to a conception of

rhetoric which is not only absurd, but also incomprehensible and

most dangerous.

II CLASSICAL AND PROTAGOREAN RHETORIC

One might take two views about the role of rhetoric in general

and in public discourse in par ticular: the classical one, and the

Protagorean one, respectively. The classical one is Aristotle’s.

Salazar takes his starting point from A ristotle’s view of politics

1 Ph -J Salazar An A frican Athens: Rheto ric and the Shaping of D emocracy in South

Africa (2002) xix.

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